Dabrowski Sues Democratic County Clerk Over Ballot Snafu
Republican gubernatorial candidate Ted Dabrowski speaks at a news conference in January. (Photo: Chicago Tribune)
A Republican candidate for Governor is suing a Democratic downstate County Clerk after the candidate’s name was misspelled on printed ballots.
Champaign County Clerk Aaron Ammons printed ballots that referred to Dabrowski, a former Illinois Policy Institute staffer who operated the “Wirepoints” conservative media company as “Tad.”
In a suit filed Tuesday in Champaign County, Dabrowski claimed Ammons, the husband of Rep. Carol Ammons (D-Urbana), would not print new ballots with Dabrowski’s correct name. The suit also claims between 4,000-5,000 mail ballots were sent with Dabrowski’s misspelled name.
About getting my name wrong on the Champaign County ballot, it’s all about incompetence,” Dabrowski said in a statement. “Problems were compounded by multiple, conflicting ballot certifications by the Board of Elections, its members all Pritzker appointed.”
A spokesman for the Illinois State Board of Elections said the authority had no role in correcting the matter, but had been providing legal guidance to the Champaign County State’s Attorney, who acts as the county’s lawyer.
Champaign County State’s Attorney Julia Rietz [disclosure: Rietz is a former political client and friend] said the Clerk’s office is working with its vendor to reprint ballots that misspelled Dabrowski’s name.
“For now, the Clerk has posted corrected specimen ballots at the single early voting site and is giving slips with the correct spelling of all Governor candidate names to each voter who requests a Republican ballot,” Rietz said. “He is also holding off on mailing out any vote by mail ballot requests until we determine that the issue can be fixed.”
About 16,000 Republican primary votes for Governor were cast in Champaign County in 2022. Around 800,000 votes were cast in the GOP primary for Governor statewide four years ago.
UPDATE : State’s Attorney Rietz says the issue has been resolved and ballots will properly identify Dabrowski as “Ted” beginning Thursday morning.
